When I first played this game I didn't know what to expect. After just a second, I was already in awe; the immense universe and gameplay pulled me into the adventure! There was so much to do and see. Sould I join the Dark Brotherhood? Or would I rather not risk being sent to prison. The choices you make effect your character and the world around you, so be wise. Though the punishment system can get annoying, it's always fun to break out of jail and steal back your gear. A great RPG, 4/5!

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Sure this game has a vast land to explore, and vistas upon vistas to explore, but. They are almost all the same. The only difference I've seen is the mountains, there is only snow and grass, from what I've seen.
Other than that this game is good, I prefer Morrowind over this but heres what happens.
You are a prisoner at the beginning (like Morrowind except you are in a prison) And the Emporer Uriel Septum visits you, then you find out there was a secret door in your prison all along. The guards tell you not to follow them, but nothing will happen if you don't so you do.
Exploration starts after a long period of time.
But then it gets really awesome, you shoot deer for the fun of it, and you kill pirates. There's no end to this game, it's purley awesome in parts, but just Damn boring in others.

My personal favorite feature is the Dark Blood Guild or something.
You kill an innocent person the first time, a message will appear that says "Your kill has been observed by sources unknown."
Whenever I first saw that I thought "Oh, they have God in this game"
So I started killing more. I slept and when I woke up, I had the shit scared out of me by some creepy rapist wearing a dark cloche.
I join their club and accidentally killed that kajhit asshole who attacked me first, and i was booted out of there.
Then I slept and woke up again to ... something, but it killed me.

I may sound like a critic, this game is actually pretty good, I just have some things to point out about it.

Graphics are amazing, enough said, Definatly an improvement to morrowind.

Yes you will find yourself addicted to this game.

3/5 is my final score.

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I found Oblivion to be an excellent experience, first of all. I'm going to bash a lot of small, niggling parts of it, but all should know that I have sunk quite a large number of my hours into this game and I was not disappointed.

In terms of gameplay, Oblivion beats out its predecessors hands-down. This is the most accessible, easy-to-control, simplest and most outright pick-up-and-play fun Elder Scrolls game of the series. That being said, the fact that it is so accessible also makes it a bit of a let-down for some older gamers such as myself.

Morrowind had an absolute plethora of skills to work on, and its classes of magic were much, much broader than Oblivion. Spellmaking and Enchanting in Oblivion is much more difficult to access, which I found to be a serious let-down. Leveling some skills is also inordinately difficult while others are far too simple to make happen. Also, it's quite easy to gimp the living heck out of yourself, which is very unfortunate. If you give yourself Athleticism as a skill, for example, you'll find yourself leveling more often than you'd like, and your combat and magical skills may not be able to keep up. That being said, this isn't much of a change, and Elder Scrolls players should have no problem adjusting.

The skill system has been simplified, which is quite nice, although I think that the Power Attacks were leaned on a bit heavily. Without the need to take Long Blade AND Short Blade to get your bases covered, this was a nice change. There are still as many magical schools, however, and because it went from the old 5-major 5-minor skill tree to 7 major and no minor, you don't have quite as much space to pack in extra little tidbits like Light Armor or Blade if you want to be a full-spec mage, which was possible in the earlier games and made one a tad more flexible. It's nice that you have to specialize a bit more, but specializing significantly without the capacity to bring a friend in on the action is kind of a giant suckbag, to put it a bit harshly. Especially since full warriors with no Security or Alteration skill simply can't pop open locked chests and doors without a special item; give me a sledgehammer, a strong arm, and some time, and I guarantee you I'll open up most any wooden treasure chest or door you can toss my way. It's unfortunate that there's no way to line up an accurate swing with a sledge and make short work of lesser locks and/or make a Strength test to bash down a door and perhaps take a bit of damage to your armor from the shoulder-bash.

Oblivion's inventory system has changed a bit as well. It was very obviously designed for use on a gamepad foremost, and therefore it's not quite as nice to use as Morrowind's management system. One of the good things here is the fact that Oblivion's inventory system has done away with left and right parts; boots come in pairs, as do bracers, and it's split into Torso, Pants, Boots, and Helmet, eliminating the need to swap out a large number of different armor pieces to change your set. It also keeps one from layering an absolutely ridiculous number of enchantments on one's gear, which I find refreshing; with just robes, pants, shoes, and maybe some armor, one could take a few powerful souls and make themselves literally unkillable in Morrowind. Not so much the case in Oblivion.

Some things have improved drastically. There are a few sparse minigames in place here, like the one for picking locks, which break up the endless first-person axing of undesirables and make the game a bit more fun to play for those like myself who are interested in popping locks and sneaking around unseen. The addition of the stealth eye, which is bright when someone can see you and dark otherwise, is actually quite nice, although it could use a little bit between 'Seen' and 'Not Seen'. Having a 'You Are Now Likely To Be Seen" stage between the two extremes would be nice, but the addition of it at -all- is good enough for me, and sneak attacks are nice and mean to help gratify us roguey types.

Combat, when it comes down to it, is such a vast improvement it's not even funny. Unlike its predecessor, Oblivion has a swing-to-hit system in place; you will not swing at something while you are not in range and not hit it. You may be parried or knocked back or generally hosed if you attempt to attack someone in a defensive posture, but enemies are in the same boat and it's easy to unbalance them and strike back, for the most part. Also, the fact that magic is off-handed (I.E. it can be used at any time) is an extremely awesome addition; being able to cast touch attacks with sword in hand or throw a quick heal in the middle of combat is so useful that playing the Morrowind is outright painful once you've gotten used to the system.

In terms of graphics, there's just nothing like Oblivion. Even now, quite a bit after the game was released, the game is just ridiculously good-looking. On my three-year-old gaming rig (ATi RADEON 9800 XT, 3.0ghz processor) it runs very nicely on medium settings. It looks excellent from flickering torchlight to bright sun to dank shadows and deep dungeons, although really, things should be darker deep underground.

As for replay, Oblivion kind of wins. There are some things that aren't great; the actual storyline isn't fantastic or particularly long, and fighting through sixteen (count 'em!) iterations of essentially the same gameplay in Oblivion Gates, it's not the most fun to play ever. The thing that makes it fun to play is how much fun it is to change up your character. Having a Master Archer one play-through, an archmage the next play-through, a melee rogue the next and a master axeman the next changes things up relatively well. It's quite a bit of fun to play, and different equipment makes for different choices in terms of how to manage combat. It's extra great because you can have weapons and shields out while you're throwing spells, although armor hurts your magical effectiveness a bit.

As for fun factor, Oblivion does a great job. There's nothing quite like it, and hopping in and caving in some mercenary skulls with a mace is just fun to do. Also, it's quite hilarious when you have a magic-reflective cuirass on or something to that effect and someone shoots you with a magical bow. Watching them light up like a pile of kindling when they loose their fiery doom arrows on you is a riot.

My few complaints involve the lack of weapon difference (no crossbows, no shurikens, no javelins, no pole weapons of any kind, no ancient dwarven devices) in that there are a few archetypes with a few different subtypes. -Material- -Archetype- of -Magical Power- is cool for Diablo, but it'd be nice if there were a few more types and a bit more flexibility, like quality or other important factors. More types of magical attack and more flexibility with magic (where is Levitate? I understand taking it out, but it was so much -fun-!) would have made me a lot happier.

All in all, this game is worth having for anyone with the computer-chutzpah to run it. It takes a solid machine, but if you have that, it's a great play, and it works nicely on the 360 and PS3 as well, if one of those is immediately available.

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The graphics are amazing. Unfortunately, the game loaded too slow on my computer... so there's one thing you have to consider. Make sure your PC is up to par before getting this game. But seriously, the story line, the gameplay elements, and the graphics are killer. The only problem I had was that the story line gets a little repetative if you go around shutting all the Oblivion gates... but it's definitely not enough to keep this game from being five stars all the way.

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This is one of those games that can come along and change and entire genre. While it does contain a few bugs, most of them are fixed by the patches and the unofficial patch. It has a great replay value because you can always download new quest and other mods. If you like RPG's, then this is a game you do not want to miss!

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Simply a stunning game. Some of the best graphics ever, every blade of grass is rendered. It's so open ended that you don't even have to do the main story here. You could spend over 200-300 hours here and still not be near done. Its an absolute treat of an RPG, this is how they all should be. A work of Art that shouldn't be missed. Game of the year in 2006 in my opinion. People complained about the combat system I personally think there was nothing wrong with it.

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This chapter of the Elder Scrolls series really shows its console orientation. It's an action-RPG borrowing much of its gameplay from first-person shooters. It includes inventive conversation and lockpicking mini-games, and a staggering number of optional quests, and a large world that is fully explorable. I spent well over 100 hours in the game, and still didn't see much of what the game had to offer.

Pros: An Incredible visceral experience. The graphics are amazing, and the AI / NPC handling is among the best I've seen. Lots to do and explore, tons of NPCs to interact with, and a plenty of optional subquests.

Cons: Emphasis on action and reflexes may not be to everyone's liking. The trips to Oblivion get pretty old and repetitive. The game automatically scales the monsters to always be about equal to your character's current level, thus making it a never-ending treadmill. The monster and magical variety tends to cap out pretty early on.

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The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is exactly what any person who has played Morrowind (The Elder Scrolls III) would expect as a sequel, and more.

The game is massive. Not just big, massive! In fact, on scale the game has more than sixteen square miles of fully-designed areas. I could barely walk sixteen square miles in real life, let alone a game. Luckily though, the developers were nice enough to give us fast-travel, which is enabled to any major location you find, excluding cities, which you can fast-travel to right after the tutorial. If you were an avid player of Morrowind, you can probably remember having to pay for services equal to these; but that, no more!

The term "massive" and it's friendly synonyms can't be used just to describe the area of gameplay. For example: The AI has an "elephantine" amount of intelligence. In fact,
before the release, the AI was too smart, and they had to dumb it down. The in-game AI (The dumb-downed version) is still impressive, with some of the most amazing path-finding skills in any game to date. Trying to use a bow from above? Uh-uh, they'll simply run up any stairs they can find and cut you down. Are you smart, and know there are no stairs? Won't work, either. They'll simply use their bow skills or magic skills at you, and they'll hide behind objects, too. But path-finding isn't their (The AI's) only glorious skill. They know both where they are, and where you are. They can hear you, they see you, and they can feel you. Think you're a master thief? Don't you dare run in your hit's house. Your so-called "sneaky" footsteps will hit the ground, make sound, and cause the owner(s) to come down and call the good ol' guard. Or is it day? You know there must be something in the Owner's private quarters, right? So you slowly sneak on up the staircase, but to your dismay, the owner saw your movement in that direction, and has followed you. Try lock-picking right in their sight, I dare you. Don't try the basement, either, (s)he'll follow you.

Now, while you're either crying because an NPC won't stop following you, or exploring the Colovian Highlands in the game, or just doing anything, you'll notice something. The graphics. To put it bluntly, the graphics are amazing, especially for the size of the game. The people (I use the term "people" lightly) you will meet look more realistic than many games. The weapons (You'll spend most of this game in first person, so yes, you'll notice them.) have more detail than any other game has even dared. The land, the water, the architecture... everything! And to place that in the mere amount of data already in the game? It definitely wasn't a small feat.

But, as you notice your weapon, you'll notice something else, too. It's actually fun to
hack/slash/smash/bash/cast/aim/hea ve/ho/etc. And unlike it's predecessor Morrowind, you can move, block, and cast spells in real-time.

Now people have been complaining about the in-game quests. Well, I can't blame them, they usually don't have a very compelling story. But, when you put that against the facts that they are fun, are at perfect sizes, and the writers had to stay up longs night scribing an apparently endless amount of quests... well, you get the idea. The main storyline has actually been built-up from the previous (No spoilers will appear here, don't panic.) Elder Scrolls games, even from the DOS-based Elder Scrolls: Arena.

Now, replayability is both huge and minimal in the game. An upside is that, on one character the game will last roughly 200+ hours. A downside is, though, once you get a high-level character, it may be a little tough to start out from the beginning once again. Although, starting a new character based differently than one of your previous (Say, a medium-difficulty warrior to a low-difficulty mage) may rejuvinate your love for the game.

But, Oblivion isn't perfect. No game is. The loading times aren't as short as we'd all like. The quests aren't too complex. The few puzzles that exist aren't too mind-boggling. It may seem repetitive at times... and there are more. The fact is: The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is one of the few near-perfect games, an epic adventure that Bethesda has finally been able to fully achieve.

Four out of five.

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Learning Curve: Instant!

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This is the best game I've ever played! Huge interactive enviroments and REALLY good graphics make this game awesome!

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Incredible game! If you're into RPGs and you're only going to buy 1 game for your XBox 360 or looking for something new on PC: BUY THIS GAME! Incredible graphics, intense storyline, interactive world and AI, TONS of replay value!

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I have got way too much time invested in this game, yet I refuse to buy the expansions knowing that it will only damper my free time down some more.

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Looks great, but the fun stops there. The guild quests were pretty short, and there weren't enough guilds in my opinion. The main storyline wasn't very intricate. All in all, for all the stuff there is to do, there's not much variation in how you do it. Go here, kill this guy, wait around, travel some more, kill some more people, steal something, now kill more people. There aren't any puzzles, there's nothing to figure out, and there isn't any character development. It's missing all of the elements that make an RPG great. If you're looking for a game where you can do "anything", pull out your D&D 3.5, but leave this game alone. This, coupled with the scaling level system, where monsters get more difficult as you level, and being restricted as a thief (how come I can't steal what's behind the glass? And why the hell do I need a fence for everything?) makes this game boring.

Much like dating a really hot chick with no brain, Oblivion seems amazing at first, but later you realize that it's missing a key ingredient: substance.

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Oblivion has been called the first next-gen RPG. People have fallen over each other to describe how beautiful it is. But is it enough?

When I started playing Oblivion, I was excited. I hadn't read much about it, but I had heard about its massive and beautiful world. And in the beginning it was nice, I could customise what my character looked like, I could run around pretty much where I wanted and look around to find new places.

But then I started to play the game a bit more. I started working on the main quest, and took on a lot of side quests, and unfortunately it was then, when I had really started playing the game, that the enjoyment wore off some.

I found the game getting repetitive. Enter this dungeon, kill X, save Y, rinse, repeat. I don't mind going dungeon crawling, but I expect to be rewarded with increased depth of the character(s) I am playing, or at least the feeling that I am getting more powerful, and I feel that is here that Oblivion fails. Oblivion has sacrificed depth for breadth, and that is its undoing.

If you enjoy going through dungeons killing things just for the sake of it, you'll have a blast, but I felt cheated. I found myself in this vast world with no real connection with my character. Taking on the main quest hardly advanced the depth of my character, and side quests were mere blips on the deepness radar. It all felt like it was just grinding for numbers.

And the numbers didn't mean much either, since Bethesda implemented a sort of levelled dungeon system, which means that the game makes itself harder dependent on your level. While it might sound like a nice idea at first, a game that adapts itself to the player, in practice it's horrible. There is never a sense of achievement when it comes to levelling, all fights just blend into one bland mass. You never get to feel that your character is getting better, other than through the numbers.

I think my dissapointment stems largely from the hype and wrong expectations. If I had been more into the action part and the dungeon grinding, then I might have enjoyed it more, but I expected a bit more story, a bit more depth, and sadly I didn't get it.

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Its a pretty good game that you can just lose time in exploring the vast open space of this game. There are also so many side quests that can keep you busy and almost ignoring the main quest.

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This is A GREAT game. I highly recommend this game for all gamers. great story line and gameplay. You will not be dissapointed.

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Oblivion instantly caught my eyes from the very first time I saw the trailer on Gametrailers.com. It is a beautiful game with many characters, races, classes, items, spells, features etc.

One thing that I truly love about Oblivion is the alternation between the different races and classes you can choose and the freedon to buy horses, houses, furniture and to invest in shops! It is a huge game where everything just seems alive. The beautiful graphics and detailed characters, monsters and environments as well as the use of visual effects using lates DirectX 9 technology, the game also comes with horrible hardware requirements for the average gamer and teenager but since most teens go for consoles rather than high-end PC's that problem is solved right there, yet there are still a few glitches in oblivion:

It tends to crash here and there;
A lot of loading areas;
No feel for the character;
The "wow Im lost" factor is pretty high;
Incredibly high requirements (PC);
The manual is a must read at some point;
The menu seems a little complicated at first;
Comes with some bugs that can be really annoying;
Some mistakes may be fatal for gameplay;
And some minor ones that are not worth adding.

Either way the game is well worth playing and so is the newly released Add-On to the game, go for it I say!

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